Alex Saab, a Colombian businessman and close ally of former Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro, was deported to the United States on May 16, according to Venezuela’s migration agency, the Administrative Service for Identification, Migration, and Foreign Affairs.
The Venezuelan regime said that Saab was deported because he had been implicated in the commission of various crimes in the United States.
Saab served as minister of popular power for industries and national production for the Venezuelan regime. He was appointed by Maduro in October 2024 and removed from the position in January by acting leader Delcy Rodríguez.
He had been released in 2023 by the Biden administration as part of a prisoner exchange involving Americans detained in Venezuela.
U.S. President Joe Biden granted Saab a pardon on Dec. 15, 2023, in exchange for 30 prisoners held in Venezuela, including 10 Americans.
Saab was accused of stealing nearly $350 million from Venezuela through the United States in a plot that involved Venezuelan officials. He appeared in federal court in Miami in 2021 after being extradited from the Republic of Cabo Verde to face U.S. money laundering charges tied to an alleged Venezuelan bribery scheme. Saab and fellow Colombian Alvaro Pulido Vargas were indicted in 2019 on one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering and seven counts of money laundering.
According to U.S. prosecutors, the two men obtained a Venezuelan government contract in 2011 to build low-income housing. Authorities allege that they exploited Venezuela’s government-controlled currency exchange system by submitting fraudulent import documents for goods that were never delivered, and bribing Venezuelan officials to approve the paperwork.
Prosecutors say the scheme allowed them to obtain U.S. dollars at favorable exchange rates and move roughly $350 million out of Venezuela through U.S. bank accounts into overseas accounts they controlled.
Saab was arrested in Cabo Verde in June 2020 while traveling through the African island nation. After a lengthy legal battle, Cabo Verde’s courts approved his extradition to the United States.
In 2020, then-Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), in a post on X, called Saab a “money man” for the Maduro regime and said that Saab was a key figure in helping Maduro facilitate Iran’s theft of Venezuela’s gold reserves.
Rubio said in 2023 that Saab was the “architect of Maduro’s corruption and money laundering operation.”
Meanwhile, Maduro is awaiting trial on federal charges, including those related to narco-terrorism and drug trafficking.
In April, the United States eased sanctions on Venezuela to allow the country to pay legal fees for Maduro.
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